The three theater chains have reached agreements with Lionsgate, Paramount, 20th Century Fox, Walt Disney and Universal Pictures where the studios will pay a “virtual print fee” each time a digital movie is shown. The fee will be used to pay off the cost of the equipment.

Warner Bros. and Sony Pictures are expected to eventually sign on to the agreement.

Details will probably be announced before the start of ShowEast, the annual convention of theater operators, in Orlando on October 13th.

Up to 3,000 digital screens could be ready to go within a year as the studios are moving aggressively ahead with the production of 3-D movies.

Disney will have Bolt out in November, A Christmas Carol in 2009 and Alice in Wonderland in 2010. Dreamworks has Monsters vs. Aliens out in March and all future animated movies will be in 3-D. Twentieth Century Fox has Ice Age 3 out next summer and James Cameron’s Avatar out for Christmas.

And guess who will actually end up paying that “virtual print fee” through higher ticket prices and outrageously-priced concessions?

Furthermore, as should have been learned from the original 3-D period in the 1950s, and from the age of widescreen experimentation, 3-D (or Cinerama or 70mm) in and of themselves cannot make a bad movie better and excessive use of these processes on unworthy material ultimately contributes to the demise of their use.

Why do I get the feeling that all this spending on digital will come back to haunt us in a few years? Granted, digital has it’s place, but it will never compare to the quality derived from 70MM, which uses a DTS timecode soundtrack today.

What a novel idea!!! Now I’ll be able to go to my local cinema and pay some inflated ticket price, to watch the same thing I can watch at home. And at home, I can do it by my fireplace. All I get in the theatre is rowdy kids running around. As Ken Layton, and CinemarkFan said, the little guy will be toast, and as a long time projectionist, give me 70MM anytime. That had superior picture and sound, long before all this digital projection and even digital sound was even thought of.

I saw my first IMAX digital movie (“Eagle Eye”) at the AMC Columbia 14. It wasn’t anything spectacular to watch compared to other digital movies. The auditorium was no larger than one of the larger AMC theaters but not bigger than the largest one. The screen size was probably 50-60 ft wide, which is about the size of our Muvico’s DLP screen. As with the non-IMAX DP movies, the colors were bright but not exaggerated, no spotting, blotches or flickering. The only major difference is the admission price of $13!!! Was it worth it? No. I’ll visit the other 2 IMAX screens to see if there is an appreciable size difference. Maybe an animated movie will look better in this format. We’ll see next month with Madagascar 2.

What you just said Movie534, is the reason why this digital stuff will eventually fall flat on it’s face. Think about it, on 2/17/09, television will be all digital. With that, why would some sane person wanna spend $12-13 dollars on a movie presented in a projection system that you get at home, for free? With high ticket prices, moviegoers will stay & wait for blu-ray for most films (save for films like Iron Man and TDK).